Spent 2 years tilling my garden beds before a neighbor laughed at me

I used to rototill my whole garden every spring in Boise. Took me hours and my back would hurt for days. Then my neighbor Carol, who's been gardening here since the 80s, watched me one day and asked why I was destroying my soil structure. She showed me her no-till beds with the straw mulch and I felt like an idiot. Anyone else switch from tilling to something easier and notice a big difference?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_phoenix26d ago

Yeah the "destroying my soil structure" part hit me hard because I did the same thing for years until I realized my earthworms were basically migrating to my neighbors' yards. Switched to just poking holes with a pitchfork and my tomatoes grew twice as big.

sam_anderson26d ago

I always thought tilling was the right way to go. My dad did it, his dad did it, so I never questioned it. But when you said the earthworms were migrating to your neighbors' yards, that really stuck with me. I started reading about it more, and it hit me how much damage I was doing. I dropped the rototiller last spring and just started using a digging fork to loosen things up. My squash and beans are way healthier than they used to be, and I actually see worms in my garden now instead of just in the grass. It feels wrong at first not to turn the soil, but the results speak for themselves.